Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Here at Shri Mahavirji Digambara Jain Atishay Kshetra, Shri Mahavirji,
Rajasthan, - a seminar (sangoshthi) with ~ 80 participants was organized
on June 8-9, 2013 on the Girnarji Hindu – Jain dispute [where on
January 1, 2013 Jain Muni Prabal Sagarji was gravely assaulted by
Muktanandgiri, the Jains are not allowed to have equal right as to
Hindus to worship at 5 th peak (known as Neminath Tunk and also as
Dattatrey Tunk) and the Jains face many other problems and harassment
during pilgrim].

During this seminar colored pamphlets (small booklet) were distributed
in which it was mentioned at many places that despite efforts of many
prominent leaders of Jain Community the Interim Order of Gujarat High
Court dated February 17, 2005 is not being implemented by Gujarat
Government therefore Jains are getting all these problems and it was
projected as if most of their problems will be solved if this order is
implemented.

I requested the participants of this seminar to provide me the copy of
this Interim Order and on June 20, 2013 I got this order copy (which I
can email if your email ID is SMSed at 07829074704) from one of the
participant (advocate in this matter) and I am surprised to see this
Interim Order. In fact this Interim Order is against Jain Community and
more or less is being implemented therefore Jains are facing all the
said problems.

It is evident from this Interim Order that Jains committed blunder of
taking burden of proving (before asking any thing from Court) that the
site is Neminath Trunk and idols / scriptures / foot-prints are of Lord
Neminath without putting similar burden on Hindus to prove that the
site is Dattatrey Tunk and idols / scriptures / foot-prints are of
Lord Dattatrey. And in the process naively gave practical exclusive
possession & title of site to Hindus and accepted the arrangement of
visiting the site as tourists or as followers of any other religion
like Muslims etc of a secular country. In a nutshell Hindus got the
possession & title and everything [that is why they took permission
from authorities (a right recognized by even Jains in Interim Order) for
new construction and for replacing idol of Lord Dattatrey] without
proving anything.

As told to me by many participants of this seminar, the main factor
behind not fighting cases in Courts etc properly by Jains is the
unfounded fear of Jains where (in a legally baseless & ridiculous
manner) Jains think that Hindus are much more in numbers than Jains and
Narendra Modi is ruling in Gujarat.

But Still there is time, Jains should organize another small seminar
with few participants at Girinarji where after studying all the pending
& so called decided cases (in Courts and with Police &
Administration) and by taking ground realty in reckoning - instead of
wasting their time in digging-out references to prove the title (as they
unnecessarily did in Shri Mahavirji on June 8-9) - the Jains should
vigorously renew legal battle to gain exclusive possession of 5 th peak
(Neminath Tunk) so that after Sidh Kshetra Sammed Shikharji the second
most sacred place for Jains the Girinarji Sidh Kshetra can be retrieved
from Hindus so that Jains can offer Pooja-Archana over there as per
Jain-Amnay {faith} during the time allowed by Court.

Here one more point is important and relevant. The Jain Tirth Kshetra /
Atishay Kshetra / Sidh Kshetra are owned, controlled and run by Trusts
of handful of people mostly from outside. For example in Girnarji Trust,
the Jains from Gujarat have negligible representation. But for
protecting Girinarji, the Gujarati Jains from Girinarji, Junagadh
District, its Division and Gujarat State are expected (being effective)
to fight & struggle - which is impractical in a democratic country
because now days nobody takes interest unless he / she has
representation and stakes in it.

Therefore if Trusts of all these are not reconstituted by giving proper
representation to local Jains through Jain Temple Societies and their
Federations and to such International Organizations of Jains in other
countries like USA, UK etc, then these apex places of Jain Religion are
bound to face more and similar problems in future and that will be fatal
for Jain Community and Religion